well whatever you me or anyone say, A Company Will Always Welcome Big Profit. ^_^ this we all do agree. I mean If I were to own a big company I'll milk out every worker and all the people of money at a small sacrifice, If I were to think about it in real life time. but for now non of us here know the real situation unless he is a board of directors or something on high position on those hdd company.

IMO HDD price now are a bit high and much higher than on other country (it's actually cheaper there in the US including your tax and stuff added together). since some items like in my country at least computer components on known brands, are almost similarly priced in the US market together with their tax added per item, as the certain items here are same price in the US + tax, and we even have a choice to get the official paper (receipt) we add 12% vat of the total price tag of that item,

well whatever you me or anyone say, A Company Will Always Welcome Big Profit. ^_^ this we all do agree. I mean If I were to own a big company I'll milk out every worker and all the people of money at a small sacrifice, If I were to think about it in real life time. but for now non of us here know the real situation unless he is a board of directors or something on high position on those hdd company.

IMO HDD price now are a bit high and much higher than on other country (it's actually cheaper there in the US including your tax and stuff added together). since some items like in my country at least computer components on known brands, are almost similarly priced in the US market together with their tax added per item, as the certain items here are same price in the US + tax, and we even have a choice to get the official paper (receipt) we add 12% vat of the total price tag of that item,

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Well some people get mad computer components cost more in their nation then others. I sometimes hear people in the EU bitch about the unfair prices they pay vs US prices. And I cant say I feel their pain. After all I'm in the US enjoying cheap prices. However I know its not the manufacturer's fault. Its the respective nations their product is being sold in that's doing it. Taxes, VAT, tariffs all these take away from a companies bottom line. Yet people expect a company to take a loss on a product just because their own government over taxes the people.

Now I am in no way saying all EU people. I'm just saying their are a lot of people out there that don't understand economics and love to blame CEOs, banks and the US for all their home grown problems.

See this is how it works....

1. HD costs 5 dollars to make.
2. Company sells it for 8 dollars.
3. In the US it retails for 10 dollars due to mild taxes and tariffs.
4. In the EU it retails for 20 dollars due to high taxes and tariffs.

Why should a company take a loss on something due to various international politics? They sell their HD for 8 bucks and whatever is added on the end by some foreign country is not their problem. Its not hard to understand there is no NWO fixing prices.

no thats exactly what supply and demand is based on and used for, and the end result is anyone buying a hdd Is getting screwed by a company , the company could just have easily sold the same amount of hdds at their old price, but who'd pay for their rebuilds then , we porbably still payed anyway with a grant or loan

It shouldn't. Companies do inflate bad news to make more profit, so it's not so far-fetched.

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That's called price gouging and price fixing and if caught is punishable under most nations laws. What you are saying is a collective of companies risked BILLIONS of dollars in fines to have a record profit that wouldn't cancel out the losses from fines if caught? Um yeah.......I'm sad anyone bought into this article.

That's called price gouging and price fixing and if caught is punishable under most nations laws. What you are saying is a collective of companies risked BILLIONS of dollars in fines to have a record profit that wouldn't cancel out the losses from fines if caught? Um yeah.......I'm sad anyone bought into this article.

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Yeah, companies price-fix quite often, taking the risk of getting caught, knowing that any investigation and punishments will take years to catch up with them. They then gamble that they'll come out ahead in all this.

The LCD panel price-fixing scandal that broke recently is just one example off the top of my head. If you think these laws put them off that much, then you're the naiive one. C'mon man!

Yeah, companies price-fix quite often, taking the risk of getting caught, knowing that any investigation and punishments will take years to catch up with them. They then gamble that they'll come out ahead in all this.

The LCD panel price-fixing scandal that broke recently is just one example off the top of my head. If you think these laws put them off that much, then you're the naiive one. C'mon man!

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Oh yeah the one that was never proven and they settled for like 500 million collectively without a conviction that had NOTHING to do with destroyed factories or price gouging?

I was glad that HDD got more expensive when crysis hit, their prices were getting ridiculously low compared to the rest of components and SSD prices were ridiculously high.. When HDD crysis hit, at least buying an SSD seemed very reasonable - before it was just absurd to buy SSD.

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You got some strange logic there. Just because HDD prices were inflated, it's then ok to buy SSD's even though their price hasn't changed. Just because the difference was smaller. Lol?
Don't you think it doesn't even matter when you'd buy SSD then? I mean it would cost you the same in the end...

lol Don't feel bad man. Thats what forums are for. Gotta take the dumb with the smart. Only way to learn IMO. newtekie1 said the same thing I did.....just more gracefully.

Record profits should have been EXPECTED during a crisis like this. If they reported a loss then people would be screaming for an investigation. Stock holders would have been PISSED.

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i saw graceful and lold i really do love you ya know. i think alot of people miss your warped sense of humor. getting back on topic im almost entirely certain i can tell my barber how close of a shave i want more gracefully then you could.

You got some strange logic there. Just because HDD prices were inflated, it's then ok to buy SSD's even though their price hasn't changed. Just because the difference was smaller. Lol?
Don't you think it doesn't even matter when you'd buy SSD then? I mean it would cost you the same in the end...

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wut? i watched SSD prices dive like $100 a month or 2 into the shortage.

Plays battlefield 3 well enough that i was ranked 1st globally in vehicles for november and december

Lets not pretend there haven't been a plethora of companies and sometimes countries conspiring to internationally fix prices for, ohhh, thousands of years almost.
I'm not saying the hd manufacturers engaged in the price fixing, but i would say that it appears as though the retailers may have done so, especially considering they buy in bulk shipments and almost instantly raised prices after the flood, but I'm not ruling out the supply and demand factor either, so maybe they didn't price fix maybe they did. Who knows lol.

I think you're mistaking the EU for some communist country. I have to pay (considerably, might I add) for healthcare and I do pay for education.

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Are you talking about taxes? Because I don't pay for either healthcare or education. Well I do pay up to €240/year for healthcare (including prescribed meds). And I am bragging about it as much as I can. ^^

On-T: HDD rices here are starting to drop, albeit very slowly. The thing here is, when prices sky-rocket, it's like radioactive fallout, nobody even considers the idea (of buying), unless it's a matter of life or death. SSD prices have also dropped, but not too much. The good thing is that some models already are ay 1€ per GB (temporarily, because it is a sale).

In price fixing a pair, or more, of companies set out to prevent a decrease in price for a given commodity. The goal of price fixing is to maintain an increasing profitability, as the cost of manufacturing goods decreases. This both increases profit for the manufacturer, and prevents pricing wars.

Price gouging is intentionally charging a large amount of money for a good, because there is no alternative. We see this often with patent trolls, but it occurs in markets where there is only one source of a commodity. When goods cannot be purchased from another source the supplier can charge what they want for it.

We've discussed supply and demand in previous posts.

So; there was no price fixing, the basic rules of supply and demand were followed, and there was no price gouging.

Supply on hand was a constant. The sellers might have a given number of parts, but they cannot get more. Price increases, to compensate for a fixed and non-replenishing supply. While saying that the supplier gouges the consumer is easy, it is inaccurate. Higher prices were a repercussion for a constantly diminishing supply of that good.

The only part of the equation that is up for debate is how fast the prices rose. If you going to argue this point, then at least come to the table with numbers that prove how the price increase cut sales so dramatically as to prevent any of them from being sold. It sucks that HDD prices increased, but it isn't a conspiracy against the consumers.